January: Fruits of Time Off

January 23, 2022

Hossain is back, Scalzi vs newcomers, and some scary non-fiction.

The Ghost Galaxy Omnibus

January 15, 2022

Another mega-series makes great promises. How long will it make it on my Kindle?

**Listen up, series-addicted military SF writers—this is a good lesson on how to write about conflict. Please take notes.**

Winding Down 2021

December 20, 2021

The winter has been unusually mild so far, much like some of the recent reading…

**I bought this on November 14, 2020 and finally finished it…a year later. Worth the push.**

November Chills

November 21, 2021

Good, bad and ugly for Thanksgiving week.

When all else fails, blow up a bunch of stuff and hope for the best." --Outcast Marine Handbook — **“When all else fails, blow up a bunch of stuff and hope for the best.” —Outcast Marines tactical plan**

Outcast Marines

November 13, 2021

Another long series, another mixed result.

Experimental Rating System

November 12, 2021

The East German judge is unamused by your effort….

**Broken, but not entirely hopeless. Well, mostly not entirely.**

Warhammer Crime: The Rise of Neo-Noir

October 15, 2021

Or, how I learned to stop worrying and love some grim, dark pulp (science) fiction…

Cassandra Khaw Rocks Out

October 01, 2021

Cannibal Chef, for starters…

Ending September, Entering Autumn

September 30, 2021

Summer is officially over, time for another update on books finished, set aside or turned off.

Dog Days of Summer Summary

August 02, 2021

In which we explore the finest reads, attempted and completed, of the hottest days of a very, very warm summer.

Post-Pre-Summer Solstice Review

June 27, 2021

More (if slightly delayed) reviews!

Spring 報復性熬夜 Festival!

April 22, 2021

Another Asian book concept, and a couple of months’ worth of updated good, bad and ugly!

End of January... →

January 31, 2021

Another Reminder

Reluctantly Embracing Oblivion

January 10, 2021

Fifteen hundred pages of alien menace and human struggle and betrayal…but will it make the list of space opera worth reading again?

Kindle Reading Spree: First Report of the New Year

January 05, 2021

Reporting early in the New Year, trying to get a jump on reading in 2021…

Book Management Update

January 05, 2021

New storage is commissioned, and some old books head to new homes…

starbarian_cover thumb.jpg — **No. Just no.**

Mid-Winter 読書 Update Encore Encore -- Part 3

December 13, 2020

The Good, The Bad and The Very, Very Delayed, Pt. 3: Discontinued, Deleted or Deselected

In keeping with past practice, I offer another part of my triage: books that haven’t made it through to the end, or which I’m suspending until I feel more like finishing them.

Mid-Winter 読書 Update Encore -- Part 2

December 13, 2020

The Good, The Bad and The Very, Very Delayed, Pt. 2: Kindle

Part 1 of this update dealt with physical books. This one will dive into more or less recently finished Kindle books.

A little music to go with the darkness of these books.

Mid-Winter 読書 Update -- Part One

December 11, 2020

Early/middle of December update on three interesting but very dark books I’ve read recently.

**Best cover of the month. This actually captured the stories.**

Almost October Wrap-Up

September 29, 2020

A round up of paper and ebook finishes, abandoned projects, and too-early-to-tells for late August through September 2020.

May 31, 2021

Are We Biased Against Hard Work?

The naturalness bias may push us away from fairly evaluating people who have had to work hard for success and towards people who seem like “natural” successes — even when we say we value the things the strivers are living.

August 4, 2020

What Business Are You In?

Change is a given in life and work, but we frequently anchor our identity in the past or to things we cannot control. There is a huge difference between being attached to a durable, lasting sense of mission (“what” and “why” we do things) rather than our business models (“how” and “where”). Getting the two confused can have a terrible price.

July 30, 2020

Pace Yourself

Ever been told “it’s a marathon, not a sprint?” Most people intuitively understand the suggestion that we should start slow and conserve our energy. Even if you’re someone who only runs when being chased, we can still learn from this.

July 28, 2020

Falling Off The Path

All of us have ambitions, and all of those come with a list of things that need to be done to see them through. But there are always temptations to do things which don’t help advance our cause. We unpack advice on dealing with the real source of our issues.

Advanced Leadership: Trust and Responsibility

High-performing organizations choose to empower and trust their employees to do the right thing. They also enforce accountability for those standards. The alternative is to try to micro-manage each individual, which creates oppressive organizational cultures and environments, and eventually saps the employees and the organization of vitality.

July 27, 2020

Do We Crawl, Walk or Run?

There is plenty of glittering advice that promises to catapult us and our work into the next realm of performance. Before we embrace this advice, we should be sure that we and our organizations are ready for it.

July 15, 2020

Don't Forget Context When Offering Advice

The Harvard Business Review article, “Look to Military History for Lessons in Crisis Leadership” offers Covid-era leaders advice drawn from throughout military history. Much of the advice, though, needs more nuance and context to be fully applicable to modern leaders.

June 29, 2020

And Then What?

Slogans capture and channel our dreams. Iteration, adaptation, and the hard work of implementation make them real. Pausing to ask “And then what?” isn’t an admission of defeat. It’s a sign of wisdom and maturity, a willingness to at least start trying to think more deeply about complex and troubling problems.

June 23, 2020

Are You Sabotaging Your Own Strategy?

Change is in the air. As we enter mid-2020, organizations and populations everywhere are grappling with a series of powerful social, economic and political shocks. There has never been safety in clinging to the status quo, but it is even less of an option now.

May 21, 2020

When Is It Okay to Quit?

It’s said that quitters never win and winners never quit, but is this true? For highly motivated people, the drive to achieve can be a direct line to accomplishment or into a dead end. The key is the ability to discern when our goals no longer suit us. Ironically, this can be hardest for the best-motivated.